Dueling Eds, Retold!
by High Planes Drifter
Summary: Ch. 4 (more from Eddy's and Ed's points of view!) up. A first-person retelling of the episode where Eddy gets in a fish-slapping duel with Rolf, with each 'scene' told from a different Ed-boy's perspective. Ch. 4 of 5.
1. Eddy: KungFu Scamming

Okay, so what do you think when I say Kung-Fu, school, and suckers?  Unless you're me, you'd probably think…eh, who cares what you'd think, my point is I'm sure it won't get you any cash.  Hey, it takes a special kind of genius to come up with something as brilliant as Master Eddy's School of Kung-Fu!

Yeah, you're kicking yourself for not thinkin' of it first, aren't you?  I mean, come on, who _wouldn't_ pay big bucks to pick up some flashy Kung-Fu moves?  Me and the boys were about to go from Brokesville to the Land of Livin' Large, all thanks to me – all we needed were a few Grade-A suckers, and I knew just where to find some…

"Hey hydrant, your fly's undone!"

All right, make that Grade-A _fruitcakes_ – what the heck, I'll take what I can get!  The good thing is that Jonny _and_ Plank have plenty of cash, and Jonny's head ain't exactly as big as it is 'coz it's full of brains, if you catch my drift.  And maybe Double-D's the brains of _my_ outfit, but _I know the most important thing of all: one big empty head, plus two big fat allowances, equals cash for Eddy!_

What else is there to know?  Time to milk the fruitcake.

"Hi-_ya!"  I'd been waiting forever in that tree just so I could jump down and scare the heck outta someone, but Jonny didn't even blink.  I guess if you spend your whole life yackin' it up with a piece of wood, people popping up out of nowhere ain't all that strange.  No problem, I had an ace up my sleeve!_

"Hi-ya!  Hi-ya!  Hi-ya!"  How'd I make five more Eddys jump down all around Jonny?  Ha, easy as pie!  I just used the – uh – the re-flexive properties of the...thing...to create an op-ti-mal illusion of...uh...

Okay, fine, so my 'ace' was some thing-a-ma-bob Double-D made, what'd you expect?  Hey, I ain't gonna do _everything_ myself!  It was still _me _that made his little trick work, though – after all, the whole point was to impress our suckers, and what could be more impressive than a truckload of Eddys?  

Yeah, you _wish_ you coulda been Jonny just then – who wouldn't?  Hey, maybe I could sell cardboard cutouts of me so everyone could have their own Eddy!  Oh man, write that down, would ya?  I've gotta get Double-D to work on that pronto!  We'd sell a million of those things to Nazz alone – and who knows how many the rest of the cul-de-sac would –

Huh?  All right, fine, back to Jonny – so there he was, surrounded by Eddys, and that sap wasn't even happy about it!  "I think I'm reliving that expired tofu, Plank!"  He looked way more worried than wowed – eh, what do you expect from a tofu-eater?  I was about to just go _scare_ some cash outta him, but then his split personality kicked in.  "Huh?  You've gotta be pulling my leg!"  The guy's cracked – I mean, all around him was the coolest guy he knows, and still all he wanted was to 'talk' to that stupid board!  "Special effects?"

Ahh, I love the sound of a sucker taking the bait, don't you?  Who cares if he was passing up a once in a lifetime chance to hang out in a crowd of Eddys – it was time to reel in the catch of the day!  "That's right, Grasshopper, only one of the lessons you'll learn at Master Eddy's School of Kung-Fu!"  

A few fancy moves – Bruce Lee, eat your heart out! – and me and ol' Melonhead were back at the garage – er, I mean the school.  Jonny looked pretty wowed when he saw how much Ed and Double-D looked like real, live karate fighters – and here Double-D had been whining at me all morning about how you had to be an expert and junk to teach people Kung-Fu!  Man, I love it when he's wrong.

Ed had a sock over his eyes like a blindfold – eh, why not, it ain't like his eyes and brain are actually connected anyway.  At least he was putting his head to good use for once, trying to use it to break some log thing Double-D was holding.  "Did I get it?"

Yeah, right, like Ed ever gets anything.  The guy needs step-by-step instructions to make cereal.

"Not by a mile, Ed, shall we try one more time?"  So how'd I rope ol' Sock-head into this one?  Nah, of course I didn't threaten to tell everyone what's under his hat – where's the fun in that?  I never use that unless I'm in a hurry – otherwise, it's just too much fun showin' Captain Intellectuiod who the _real_ brains of the group is.  Lemme let you in on a little secret: Double-D's got more buttons than a…um…thing with a whole lot of buttons – a sweater, yeah, that'll do – and I know where every, single, one is.  Wanna get him sloshing around in the sewer?  Remind him of all the spiders down there!  Wanna dress him up like a clown and rent him out to the other kids for cash?  Get him all worked up about 'investigating' why so many people are afraid of clowns.  And, wanna get him to tie a sock around his head and stand in a stinkin' hot garage trying not to get clobbered by Ed?  Let him wear that stupid lab coat of his and tell him he can be a teacher.  "Remember, Ed – envision the log, focus, and make contact!"  

It's so easy, it's almost unfair! 

"Hi-ya!"  Ed smashed through the log like it was – well, anything else he smashes through.  He's an animal!

"Hallelujah!"  Double-D waved the broken bits of wood around like they were cash or something.  "Mind over matter triumphs!"  Heh, who'da thought _he_ could get so into the whole Kung-Fu master gig?  It was almost enough to make me forget the time he sprained both his arms just tryin' to open the refrigerator.  "Let's do it again!"

Yeah, like Ed needs practice breaking stuff – oh well, it was good for sales.  Jonny looked pretty wowed at what Ed could do with his head; he must've been thinking of all the damage he could do with his own huge honking melon.  Time to seal the deal!

 "We can enroll you today for only a quarter, Grasshopper!"  Oh yeah, I could taste the jawbreakers already…

Jonny was as excited as if I'd told him my shoes talk to me.  "Now there's a deal, huh Plank?"  Hey, wait a minute, was that too easy?  Maybe I shoulda charged him fifty cents, or even –

Oh, great.  Just then he got that look on his face, that look he always gets when the voices in his head start speaking up.  I _hate_ the voices in Jonny's head.  Especially one in particular.

"Plank says make like a rocket and take off!"

Yeah, Plank's a riot, ain't he?  Just gimme five minutes alone with that termite trap and I'll show you a _real_ riot…

Ed would never forgive me if I did something like that, though – the big lump really thinks Plank is real!  I used to try to tell him that Plank's just a piece of wood carried around by a full-bore nut-job, but all he'd ever do was laugh and say junk like, 'The sandpaper minions have poisoned your mind!' so I gave up.  Eh, Ed's head is gonna be full of stupid things no matter what, I guess one more dumb belief ain't hurting anything.  But it meant I couldn't mess with Plank then – uh, not that I'd let Ed tell me what to do, but you don't want an unhappy Ed on your hands, he'd have flooded the garage in no time with his blubbering, the big baby – but that didn't mean I couldn't have a little fun with Jonny.  "I shall honor your decision, oh Head of a Thousand Gallons."  Hey, if Jonny just _happened_ to get himself bashed by Ed, well, it's not like I could help it, right?

"I am one with my shoe-size, Double-D!"  Ed musta been talking about his IQ.

"That's nice, Ed.  Just hit the danged thing!"  Double-D was too busy trying not to get himself clobbered to notice my ol' switcheroo – one lump of wood, for one wood-lovin' lump, was this gonna be great or what?

Sock-head noticed a second too soon, though.  "Jonny?!"  He snatched Jonny back just before Ed would've hit him – man, what a lousy time for Double-D's reflexes to start working!  "Eddy!"

That's when Jonny stomped off, as huffy as Jimmy that time I switched his hair-gel for shoe polish.  "That was so funny I forgot to laugh."  That's the same thing Jimmy'd said, too!

Man, can't anybody take a joke?  "Let me remind you, ya wood-lovin…"  Eh, forget it, he was too ticked off by then to fork over any cash anyhow.  Time for a new sucker.  And there are lots of things that bug me about Peach Creek, but a sucker shortage sure ain't one of them!  You could spit out your window and hit one – and that's just what I wanted to do when I saw who was outside.

"Hey Kev!"  I didn't have to run too fast to keep up with Kevin as he rode past on his rustbucket bike.  "Ever thought of taking Kung-Fu lessons?  Real cheap!"  Cheap?  Heck, I'd sign him up for nothing if it meant watchin' Ed head-chop that overblown jerk into next week!

But nooo, of course he had to be a bad sport about it.  "Get away from me."  Oh, boo-hoo, like I really wanted to hang out with him.

Forget Kevin, all of a sudden I was surrounded by new suckers-to-be – what'd I tell ya, Peach Creek's full of 'em!  "Hurry, Sarah, I think it's started!"  I was sure Jimmy would wanna sign up – that little twerp could use _anything_ that'd make him less of a pansy.  Heck, even Double-D could teach him a thing or two, and that ain't saying much!

"What is it?"  I wasn't even gonna try to sign Sarah up – hey, I like cash just as much as the next guy, but _I_ sure didn't wanna teach that she-gorilla anything more about how to hit people.

But Nazz, though – now _she_ would've been a perfect customer!  "It's supposed to be important or something!"  And if I could've gotten Nazz signed up, Double-D would've been out of a job and I would've been her personal instructor – I'm sure that's what she would've asked for, anyway!

She never even got the chance, though.  Everyone ran right past us as if we _weren't_ the coolest thing to ever happen to Peach Creek – what was that all about?  "Where're they going?  I hate it when they don't tell us about stuff!"  Talk about nerve!  "What could be more important than Master Eddy?"

"Cookie dough!  Yum-yum-yum!"  Ed chased after everyone as if they'd offered him a lifetime supply of earwax – now come on, that just wasn't right!  _I'm_ the leader, how am I supposed to lead if Ed's already in front?  But forget him, at least I could count on Sock-head to stick around and help me fleece the masses.  Or so I thought.

"They say to gain knowledge, one must seek it!"  Huh?  Even when I understand all the words Double-D uses, I still don't get what he's trying to say half the time.  "Shall we, Eddy?"  All I know is that he was following right after Ed – yeah, like Ed could ever lead him to 'knowledge'.

That's when I realized I was alone – and with no suckers left to scam, what else could I do but go catch up with the boys?  Man, what a gyp – in ten seconds I'd gone from being _this_ close to cashing in on my greatest scam ever, to having to follow the Karate Klutz and the Sissiest Samurai (if it weren't for me, those two morons woulda worn their stupid Kung-Fu outfits all day, talk about no sense of style!) just to see what stupid thing the stupid neighborhood was all so stupid excited about.

The day just couldn't get any worse.


	2. Edd: When Sea Cucumbers Attack

"They say to gain knowledge, one must seek it!  Shall we, Eddy?"

I hurried after Ed, making sure to give Eddy a wide berth just in case he remained fixated on his latest cockamamie get-rich-quick scheme.  I mean, really, Master Eddy's School of Kung-Fu?  Who could possibly fall for such a farfetched setup?  I'm sorry, but twelve straight hours of Japanese monster movies does not a martial arts master make, no matter _how_ enthusiastically Ed may have been chopping through walls with his head afterwards! 

Now please don't misunderstand me – despite my misgivings, I never would have dreamed of leaving Eddy and Ed to carry out this ill-advised plan on their own – I shudder to think of the havoc they could have wreaked if left unsupervised!  And I must admit, the lure of acting as the, ahem, 'school''s head instructor was more than I could resist (curse my weakness for all things academic!).  But things were rapidly deteriorating by the time this newest diversion came about, and so I was more than content to let the matter of 'Master Eddy' go the way of 'Giganu-san, Scourge of Tokyo' in the grand finale of Ed's monster movie marathon from the previous night.

Much to my relief, Eddy resigned himself to following us with minimal argument.  As for me, I couldn't help but feel a brief thrill of anticipation at the possibilities presented by this new mystery – why, could the source of all the excitement be something as mind-expanding as a bookmobile, or as culturally-enriching as a new museum opening up along the main thoroughfare?

Some days, even _I_ have to wonder at my unbridled optimism.

By the time my friends and I had arrived, the rest of the cul-de-sac was already in attendance, no doubt eager for any small distraction from the drudgery of this seemingly endless summer (oh, _when _will school resume?).  Despite the crowds, I had an unobstructed view of the spectacle at hand, although I hope you'll understand if I wasn't exactly overjoyed by that.

Dressed in some faintly glistening violet material of indeterminate origin, perched high atop a makeshift pedestal – a pedestal, no doubt, that was never tested for balance or load-bearing integrity – stood Rolf, basking in the attention of his bewildered audience.  At least, _I _was bewildered – the rest of the cul-de-sac seemed to be taking Rolf's uniquely ethnic garb in stride.  Sometimes I wonder if those power-lines bordering our cul-de-sac might not be a factor in my peers', ah, occasionally unorthodox behaviors… 

"Hey Rolf, what'cha doing?"  Jonny spoke the question on everyone's mind, albeit in a less grammatically correct fashion than one could have hoped.

"Rolf thought no one would ask!"  Well, I have to give Rolf credit, he certainly met the gawking stares with aplomb – in fact, he seemed positively pleased at the attention, if you can imagine that!  "Feast your eyes on Rolf's customary dress, sewn together from the membrane of the great sea-cucumber!"  Sea-cucumber membranes?  How unsanitary!  Didn't he realize that sea-cucumbers are known to give off a toxin capable of causing extremely unpleasant rashes?  But even as I began a mental inventory of my medical supplies in preparation for the anti-inflammatory ointment I was sure Rolf would soon be needing, he continued with his explanation.

"The fittings were excruciating, but that's another story."  You'll forgive me, I hope, if I remain less than shattered that we didn't hear that particular story?  "All for the honor of Rolf's Great Nano!"  I couldn't help but wince at this reference to 'Great Nano,' fearing the onset of yet another interminable story about this revered ancestor.  Forgive me if I sound rude, but even _I_ have my limits when it comes to hopelessly convoluted yarns such as Rolf is capable of spinning!

"Let us celebrate, yes!"  Faced with the prospect of another Great Nano story, I was almost relieved when Rolf launched into talk of celebration.  "Every year as part of our guilt-ridden traditions Rolf's family pays tribute to Rolf's Great Nano and the mighty sea-cucumber!"  Oh, what horrors awaited us _now_?

"Right on!"  Leave it to Jonny to greet the Sea-Cucumber festivities with such enthusiasm.  Eddy insists poor Jonny is, ah, in less than full control of his mental faculties…There are days when I don't completely disagree with his diagnosis…

"Welcome, my friends, don't be shy!  Feast from the box of food made from the respected sea creature!"  It was at this juncture, as Rolf began distributing what looked suspiciously similar to Ed's ill-fated attempt at 'belly-button lint farming,' that I began to regret my hasty abandonment of Eddy's Kung-Fu endeavor.  That's one thing about Peach Creek – no matter how ludicrous you think your present circumstances might be, an even more outlandish situation is never far away.

Yes, I had realized that I could stomach Eddy's 'I told you so's' far more easily than a mouthful of sea-cucumbers, and was about to suggest that we return to our never-ending scams, but already I was too late. 

"Try one, Ed-boy!  Momma's sea-cucumber balls are good for the digestion spout!"  Oh dear, Rolf was offering his aquatic atrocities to _Eddy_ of all people!  I readied an apology for the rudeness I expected to spew forth from Eddy's 'digestion spout,' but to my astonishment, Eddy accepted the proffered 'treat' with an almost-polite "No foolin'?"  For one brief, shining moment, I entertained the hope that perhaps my influence truly was rubbing off on Eddy – in manners, at least, if not in grammar – but I didn't have long to savor this possibility before I myself was confronted with Rolf's 'respected sea creature'.

"Um, wh-why thank you Rolf."  Every nerve in my hand cried out for me to drop the pulpy-yet-leathery hors-d'oeuvre, but I could never forgive myself for such an insensitive gesture in the face of Rolf's unflagging enthusiasm.  Still, I couldn't bear holding it much longer (it was pulsating, I tell you, why in heaven's name was it _pulsating_?!?), so I reflexively slipped it beneath my hat (seventeen shampooings later, and my hair _still_ smells undeniably fishy – oh, the price I pay for my polite nature!).

And as if that wasn't bad enough!  "Hey, Double-D Sock-head!"  Ah, 'Sock-head,' Eddy's favorite term of 'endearment' for me – well, I suppose it could be worse, thank heavens for his stubborn refusal to employ his creativity in any pursuits not directly related to income-generation.  "See that knothole on the fence?  Bet I can hit it!"

I couldn't believe my ears, how could he be so insensitive??  "Eddy, no!"  He ignored my protestations and launched Rolf's sea-cucumber ball at the fence.  It was awful, I tell you, truly awful!  As the sea-cucumber ball hurtled ever nearer its demise, I tore my gaze away to watch the growing expression of horror on Rolf's face – no doubt about it, those abominable appetizers represented far more than an unsavory means of gaining nourishment!

Eddy, however, was typically oblivious to the effects of his latest misdoing.  "Stupid fish-ball."  As Rolf ran inside, Eddy handed me another sea-cucumber and pointed me towards the fence.  "Give it a shot, Double-D!"  

That's just Eddy's way of being friendly, I know, but I do wish he could be a bit more selective of his moments.  "Eddy, show some respect!"  I mean, was he truly unable to gauge the impact his actions had on Rolf?  

My reproach served only to irritate him, however.  "What's your problem?"  I was about to explain the situation, but Ed spoke up first.

"It's his hat, Eddy, he always wears it and he talks forever about stuff!  Not to mention his obsession with cleanliness, big problem!"

…

W-well, one can't fault Ed for speaking his mind, can he?  Heh-heh, loveable oaf…In my own defense, I don't think I'm 'obsessed' with cleanliness, do you?  I mean, there's nothing wrong with enjoying a well-ordered, contaminant-free environment in one's own home, especially when every other aspect of one's life is saturated with chaos and, well, for lack of a better word, 'messiness'…wouldn't you agree?

And…I'm not really _that_ verbose…am I?

Oh yes, Rolf!  Please excuse the momentary digression…um, one that, I hope, you don't think went on forever?  But as I was saying, Ed's editorial notwithstanding, it was at that moment that Rolf returned from inside his house, where he had apparently shed his festive aquatic costume in favor of something far more, um, somber.

"Rolf mourns the loss of his honor."  Oh my…I had realized, of course, that Eddy had upset him, but who could have guessed that the untimely demise of one sea-cucumber ball could merit such an extreme reaction?  Of course, Rolf _is_ quite unpredictable at times, I suppose I should be grateful he hadn't come back out with his…uh…h-hat of discipline…"As you leave, please trod on Rolf's face, as Eddy has shamed the son of a shepherd!"

I'd like to say my fellow residents were sympathetic to poor Rolf's plight, but if they were, they knew of no better way of expressing it than to heed his request and exit via a path that took them directly over his face.

Eddy, meanwhile, remained stubbornly oblivious.  "What'd I _do_?"  I hope you don't judge him too harshly, I believe he truly was unclear as to the reason for everyone's consternation.  He's never exactly been in-tune to the feelings of others, and with role models like his elder brother (who, though I've never met him, does seem to be the source for much of Eddy's, ah, less-than-desirable personality traits) and his parents (used car salesmen, the both of them – why, the first time I had dinner at their house I found myself paying a dime per napkin before Eddy came to my aid!), I suppose I can understand why.  I do what I can to try to instill more well-mannered behavior in him, but, well, let's just say he doesn't quite perceive me as the ideal role model.

"Hurry up guys, before he gets up!"  Oh heavens, I'd forgotten all about Ed!  That's _never _a safe mistake, at least if you prefer that things _not_ be blown up, devoured, or otherwise hopelessly mangled.  "Rolf has such good parties!

"No, Ed!"  I couldn't let Ed trample poor Rolf, we'd done far more than enough to him as it was!  "We'll leave _this_ way!"  Through some wildly unlikely, though happily well-timed, marvel of physical improbability, I mustered what strength I had and somehow halted Ed's overly-enthused stampede.  You think it's difficult building satellites out of cardboard boxes or bicycles out of hand-me-down kitchenware?  Try bringing Ed to a halt against his will sometime!  "Boy, you're heavy, Ed!"  Now that was understatement at its best, my arms are _still_ aching from that miracle of overexertion!

"Would somebody tell me what I did wrong?"  Eddy might not exactly have felt guilty over his misdeeds, but at least he recognized that _something_ was amiss – it was a start, I suppose!  "What did I _do_?"

I could have explained that through his actions, he'd expressed not only his disdain for sea-cucumber cuisine, but for Rolf's heritage, Rolf's beloved Great Nano, and ultimately Rolf himself – but at the moment I was too busy loading Ed into a dolly I had fortunately stored in my pocket earlier that day (should I be disturbed at the seemingly impossible capacity of my pockets?  Well, to tell you the truth, there are any number of phenomena in my life that seem to be in utter violation of the laws of physics…I-I find that for my own peace of mind, it's best not to dwell on them).  At any rate, were I not busy with Ed, I could have explained all this to Eddy, thereby enriching his appreciation for the cultural differences that – 

Oh, who am I kidding, Eddy never would have listened to me anyway.  "Let's go, Eddy."  At the very least, I could aid Rolf by ridding him of my friends and myself.  

"I didn't do anything…"

Yes indeed, sometimes the gift of absence is the best thing one can give.


	3. Ed: Get on board the Storytime Express!

Hello!  Welcome to my head!  I am Ed, singer of the Cole-Slaw song!  Will you sing it with me?

Oh, but maybe you don't know it, huh?  Double-D says I shouldn't make people sing songs only I can hear – he says that is rude with a capital "Q"!  Uh, I think that is what he said.  Okay, Ed will tell you a story instead!  Buckle up, little buckaroo, and get on board the Storytime Express!

It all started when I was in the junkyard with my pals, Eddy and Double-D, and we had found the coolest van ever!  It smelled just like my room so I felt right at home – but boy, did it take Double-D a long time to get in!  I thought he was scared that the terrible Baron von Fahrvergnugen was waiting inside to suck out all our brain juice, but I guess he was just having a hard time climbing in, 'coz after a while Eddy yelled something – to scare away the Baron, I guess – and then he helped Double-D get in.  Eddy is such a good pal, he always looks out for me and Double-D!  And after I pulled Double-D up off the carpet and knocked away those funny little star-thingies that were flying around his head he looked real happy to be there, too.  He sat down between me and Eddy and stayed real still, like he was pretending the van was made of acid and he was trying not to touch anything in case it might melt the skin right off his bones!  Ho-ho, he has such a good imagination!

Oh yeah, the van.  I was going to drive us all to the world of everlasting pudding pops, but Eddy said he would let me drive when Rolf's pigs learned to fly – oh boy, I did not know Wilfred was so talented!  And if Wilfred could fly, maybe Victor could, too, and Gertrude the chicken, and maybe they would all fly right out of Rolf's barn and swoop down to pick me up so we could all fly off to a world where you sleep on beds of buttered toast, and gravy flows right out of the faucets!  I tried to teach my bathtub faucet to do that once by filling up the tub with gravy so I could show it what I wanted, but it did not work – I don't think it knew what I meant, faucets are weird!  But now Rolf's animals could fly us away to Gravyland where the faucets already knew what to do, oh boy!  I forgot all about driving then, all I wanted was to keep my head out the window so I would not miss the flying animals.

But Eddy was driving really slow, I guess he was afraid he would hit the flying pigs.  We did not see any, though, maybe Rolf locked them all up in his barn so they would not fly away.  That must be why Eddy got so mad and yelled, "What's Rolf's problem?"  

I was gonna pull my head in to tell him he should drive us over to Rolf's so we could free the pigs, but when I looked I couldn't see him or Double-D so I tried to turn my head back out the window.  I didn't see them outside either, though, so I thought maybe they were in the van after all so I turned back again and somehow my feet ended up where my head usually is and my hair got stuck on the fuzzy van carpet – it tickled, kind of like Velcro only exactly not – and I could not get up!

Oh no, what if Rolf's animals had flown them to Gravyland without me?  "Help me, guys!"  I was so scared they had gone and left me all alone, but when I got free of the horrible Velcro monster, I found Eddy and Double-D waiting right outside the van – those guys are the best, they would never go to Gravyland without me!

Eddy was yelling at Double-D about something – gosh, he does that a lot!  Maybe he's worried that Double-D's hat makes it hard for him to hear.  I don't know why, though, since his hat does not cover his ears – boy, Eddy should pay more attention to stuff, huh?  

But then I noticed that they both looked pretty upset, I guess because they did not know how to get the flying animals.  Eddy and Double-D aren't too good with animals – Eddy says they are useless because they never have any money, and Double-D is always so nervous all the time, I guess he makes animals nervous, too – so I knew they would never get them without me.   Ed to the rescue!  "Why don't you bake cupcakes, Eddy?"  Rolf's animals love cupcakes!

"Cupcakes?"  I love it when Double-D stares at me like that, 'coz I know it means he's really impressed with my good idea!  He likes being the smart one, though, so I try not to do that too much. 

"Monobrow's right."  Eddy says he calls me Monobrow because I only have one nose.  Or maybe it was because he likes my jacket so much, I forget now.  "All this talk about food's making me hungry!"  Oh boy, cupcakes good for Ed!  We were going to bake cupcakes, and it was all my idea!  I am the ideal idea man for dealing ideas!  Did that rhyme?

"Very well, then, bake your cupcakes."  Sometimes Double-D sounds mad when he means to sound happy – poor little dickens, it must be hard to blend in with us humans when you're really a half-lizard mutant.  That is okay, though, because me and Eddy like him anyway.  "But offer them to Rolf as a token of apology!"  I tried to use cupcakes as tokens once, but then the arcade manager kicked me out because he said I was breaking his machines.  I would've told Double-D that wouldn't work, but then I started thinking about how much fun it would be to go to the arcade and defeat the evil space-hams in that game Zenda, Defender of the Pork People, and I forgot all about the cupcakes.

But Eddy was there to remind Double-D.  "Nope.  No cupcakes."  Double-D seemed really disappointed about that.  I guess he wanted to play Zenda, too.

"Fine!  Then if you won't apologize, I will!"  Did he do something bad?  "A healthy potted plant should open the door to diplomacy!"  I don't think 'dip-lo-ma-cy' is a real word, is it?  Ho-ho, that is what I love best about Double-D – even when he does not know what to say he still says stuff, only he makes it up so nobody can tell!  That is why he is so smart, huh?  And to prove how smart he was, he pulled a plant right out of nowhere – I asked him to show me how he does that once but he just sort of laughed a little and said some words I did not understand.  Maybe it's a secret they taught him in that 'gifted' class he always goes to in school when the rest of us are at gym – boy, he is so lucky!

Oh, but then he ran off, so me and Eddy followed behind – three brave soldiers, off to fight a battle for the freedom of the amazing flying animals!  

And that, my friends, is the story of how the Band-Aid got its name!  What?  Oh yeah, I mean the story of how stuff happened to me and my buddies down at the junkyard.  Pretty good, huh?  Okay, you can go now, Ed needs to search for his flying pigs!

Oink!


	4. Ed and Eddy: Mutant Rutabagas and Milli...

**Author's Note:  **Hiya, HPD here again!  The final two chapters will feature multiple Ed-boys – this time it's Ed and Eddy (don't worry, Double-D will be back next time, right now he's, uh, still recovering from the exertion of bringing Ed to a halt in his earlier chapter ;)  Ed's bit is first, but I'll let you know when Eddy's taking over.  In the meantime, thanks, those of you who reviewed the earlier chapters – Jaha, I'm glad Ed made you feel a little more Einsteinian; F. and Crystal, I'm glad you particularly enjoyed Double-D's part (he's such fun to write!); Kristin, thanks for your kind words about my earlier stories, too, and Kitty, I'm glad you liked Ed's POV, he's certainly, er, challenging!  And thanks to those of you reading this chapter now – have fun! 

~High Planes Drifter~

*****Ed's POV*****

You know how sometimes you're looking for flying animals with your pals Eddy and Double-D, and you get to where the flying animals are only they're not flying but there's a guy named Rolf buried in the vegetable patch so you decide to play 'Mutant Rutabaga Invaders' with him instead?  Ho-ho, I love it when that happens!  

That is why I was so excited when we got to Rolf's farm!  Rolf was buried in the dirt just like the creatures in 'I Was a Teenage Rutabaga' – did you ever see that movie?  The part where brave Doctor McDonald attacks the horrible rutabaga army with only a vegetable peeler is one of my favorite vegetable fight scenes ever!

Eddy must've been scared of the rutabaga people, though, because he pulled me back right away so we could hide behind the barn.  Not Double-D, though, he walked right up – boy, he is so brave when he is not being afraid of stuff all the time!

"Oh my, Rolf, I may be unfamiliar with your customs, but this seems a tad extreme!"  There was a guy named Tad in my gym class last year, but the only time he did something extreme was when Eddy poured itching powder down his shorts.  Um, he did not look like Rolf, though – I think maybe Double-D was confused because of the funnel.  

"Go away!"  Rolf did not like being called Tad, I could tell.  I wouldn't either, if I had a cool name that sounded like the noise the Lava Urchin of Pluto makes just before it spews its deadly acid all over its victim!

I think Eddy was confused about Rolf being Tad, too.  "I'll give you a quarter if you tell me what's going on!"  Ooh, ooh, question for Ed!  I could tell Eddy all about the Lava Urchin and how it would wipe out Peach Creek with its terrible stomach juices, and how if only we had a real rutabaga person to save us we might survive, but since Rolf was just pretending (Double-D tells me the difference between real and pretend all the time!) and was not even really named Tad, we did not stand a chance!

Oh, but then I got worried that maybe Eddy would be even more scared if he knew the terrible danger we were in, so I thought I better not tell him.  "I haven't got a clue, Smarty-Pants!"  Ed takes care of his little pals and their smart pants!

Double-D was still saying stuff to Rolf – sometimes it is hard for Double-D to be quiet, he has so many words up in his brain and I don't think he can keep them from escaping because they keep getting out through the gap in his teeth, poor little dickens – so I ran over to help.  Oh, and I took Eddy with me so he wouldn't have to be all alone – sometimes when me and Double-D are working on stuff, Eddy just sits there and doesn't join in, like he is afraid we do not want his help – isn't that sad?

"Hold it, stop right there!"  Gee, maybe Double-D really didn't want Eddy joining in!  I dropped Eddy then so Double-D would not get mad at me, just in case he really was a secret agent for the Lava Urchins – better safe than a lobster, I always say!

Eddy looked kinda mad, I guess he does not like Lava Urchins.  "I suppose you're gonna tell me it's my fault Rolf's acting like a mole?"  Oh boy, I do the best mole impersonation!  I wanted to jump onto Eddy's back to show him what a good mole I was, but Double-D was busy yelling at him about plants so I thought I should wait.  Like Double-D always says, manners make the world go to Las Vegas!

"Give Rolf the plant, Eddy!"  I don't understand why Double-D thought Rolf wanted a plant, Rolf has a lot of those already!  But Double-D is really smart so I'm sure it was a good idea.

"Man, you're worse than my mother!"  Double-D does kind of look like Eddy's mom, if you squint so hard your eyes are closed and you think of a picture of Eddy's mom instead of Double-D.  That must've been what Eddy was doing, too, because he never would've listened to Double-D like that!  "There you go Rolf, sorry for hurting your whatever."  Oh no!  Eddy hurt Rolf's whatever?  I had a whatever once, but Sarah told on me and my mom took it away.  I almost started crying when I thought of Rolf's poor little hurt whatever, but then Rolf crawled up out of the dirt just like a mutant potato zombie, back from the dead to make us all pay for our love of French fries!  

"It lives!"  That's what they always say when a zombie comes up out of the ground in the movies, huh!  "Hiya, Rolf!"  I do not think they say that as much, but I wanted the potato zombie to know I was its friend.

"Hiya, Stretch!"  Eddy must have been thinking the same thing, only he must've been scared again because he couldn't remember Rolf's real name.  "Nice plant, huh?"  Why, yes, I am!  "Don't forget to water the – "

"You mock Rolf yet again, with the Potted Shrub of Ridicule?"  Um, I don't know what that means, do you?  Sometimes Rolf is hard to understand, just like Double-D, only with Rolf you should always listen because it sounds so funny when he talks!  "For the honor of Rolf's Great Nano, I challenge you to a duel!"  Oh boy, just like in 'Deep-Freeze Duel of the Popsicle-People'!

"A duel?"  Double-D sounded confused about that, probably because he'd been reading the whole time we were watching that movie and he missed all the important stuff, so I don't think he understood that Rolf wanted Eddy to try to push him into a great big freezer! 

Rolf wasn't real good at playing Popsicle-People, though.  "Prepare yourself, Ed-boy, as honor will be mine!"  That line was all wrong – it was supposed to be 'Prepare to meet your doom, freezer-burned fiend from the ice-cube tray!'

And I was so disappointed with Eddy, all he did was say, "What'd I do now?" and walk away!  I picked up Double-D and ran after him so I could tell them both that he should have said something cool like, 'I will melt your freezy goodness and toast your Popsicle sticks to ashes!'  My pals try real hard, but sometimes they just do not get it.

Boy, what would Eddy and Double-D do without me?

*****Eddy's POV*****

So after Rolf's latest hissy fit, I decided to go back to the junkyard to drive my van.  I guess Ed and Double-D were there, too – yeah, I let 'em come along, even though they didn't help me at all at Rolf's.  Hmmph.

Stupid Rolf.  All I did was throw his stinky old fish-ball against the fence, it ain't like I broke his stupid pig or anything!  I was just showing off my Major League pitching arm, and now he thinks I'm gonna fight him?  Yeah, right!  With a million-dollar face like mine, I can't afford to go getting into stupid fish-ball fights!  Hey, it ain't like it's my fault Rolf's stupid country only ever cooks stuff that smells like Ed's closet!

And speaking of Ed…"Can we stop for ice cream?"  Stupid Ed.  I wouldn't have stopped for him even if I was really driving, the lousy traitor.  I mean, come on, he's supposed to help me when stuff like this happens, he doesn't know any better than that, right?

"Ed, please!"  And most of all, _stupid_ Double-D – this whole thing's _his_ fault, I'd never be in this mess if it wasn't for him!  "Eddy's concentrating on the near-at-hand duel!"  You know what?  I bet he gave me that plant on purpose – that little sneak _wanted_ to get me in trouble, didn't he?  Yeah, I bet he was trying to teach me one of those stupid 'lessons' of his again – well, I'll show him, I ain't learnin' a _thing _from this!  

"Like I'll show up, Mr. Give-Rolf-a-Plant."  Ha, _that's_ showing him!  

Man, why'd I ever listen to him in the first place?  This whole mess just goes to show why _I'm _in charge and not Double-D – if I'd just ignored Captain Conscience and let Ed make those cupcakes like I wanted, we woulda been living large by now, chowing down all the cupcakes we wanted and selling the rest to the neighborhood chumps!  What could be better than that?  Definitely not sitting in some stinking van in the middle of –

"Look out, Eddy! There's someone on the road!"  Geeze Louize, Ed scared the living daylights outta me!  I was ready to shove him _and_ Professor Polite right outta my van, but then I saw what he was babbling about – who the heck does that Kevin think he is, getting in my way like that?  He's just lucky I was out of gas!

"Hey dork, it's time for – "  *HOOONNNK!!!*  

Heh-heh – dork, huh?  That oughta teach that overblown jerk not to – ack!

That square-jawed bike-monkey got his paws on me before I even knew what was going on – he's just lucky I wasn't ready for him or I would'a shoved his bike right up his nose!  And – and I could've gotten away any time I wanted, too, only I, uh, didn't wanna mess up my face, remember?  Yeah, that's it!

Besides, I shouldn't even have to be fighting – where the heck was Ed?  Shoot, where was Double-D, even?  I'll take what I can get!

But noooo, neither of them did anything – well, the heck with them, like I really need help from Mister "Less Brains than a Spoon" _or _Mister "Less Muscles than a Slipper"!

No, wait, I didn't mean that – come on, guys, I was just jokin' about all that stuff I was thinking before!  Help your – aagh! – help your good pal Eddy!

Guys?  Did I ever tell you two how much I, uh, respect you?  Buddies?  Come on, don't you wanna rescue bestest friend – NOW???

Pals?


End file.
